Songs of the Night Sparrow
by UnmovingGreatLibrary
Summary: An ongoing series of slice-of-life stories about Mystia and her food stand.
1. Chapter 1

"Okay!" Kyouko said, and spread a paper out on the countertop. "Check _this_ out."

"Hmm?" Mystia looked up from the lamprey she'd been dicing. After wiping her hands on a towel, she leaned across the counter, trying her best to read the upside-down text. "What's this?"

"What's this? _This_ is my new set list for our show next week!" Kyouko flipped the paper around and pushed it forward. "Um! I was thinking we could drop the sutra song, and instead we play _Shrine Maiden_ in two bits, and then we squeeze the new song in toward the end..."

"Hmm..." Mystia pulled the paper closer and looked over it. Kyouko's handwriting was shaky, and some of the characters were upside down, backward, or transposed. She'd only started learning to read since joining the temple, and it was a remarkably good attempt for a learner. On the page was written:

 **SMASHING THINGS  
SHRINE MAIDEN (PART 1)  
ANGRY FACE  
SHOUTING IN THE NIGHT  
SPARROW SHOOTS BACK  
SHRINE MAIDEN (PART 2)  
BORING BORING BORING  
MOUNTAIN SONG  
EAT THE HUMANS  
YOUKAI CRUSHER**

Mystia considered this for a short while. It wasn't too different from the set list that they'd used for the last few shows, but... "Do you really think we're ready to play Eat the Humans? It's not like we have much but the chorus."

"The chorus is the most important part! Besides, I was thinking that we could figure out the rest tonight! Your business is slow right now, right?"

Mystia nodded and pushed the paper back. Business _was_ slow lately, she had to admit. "Sure," she said. "As long as no customers show up, okay?"

"Customers? I'll keep an eye out..." Kyouko said. Her ears flattened to her head in concentration as she dug through the bag she'd dropped by the bench, and she pulled out an old ballpoint pen and a crumpled folder. Flipping through the folder, she pulled out a heavily-annotated sheet of lyrics. "Ummm... so, after the first bit, it's kinda dum-dum-de-dum," she said, and tapped out a rhythm on the counter with the pen. "And then it goes right to the chorus. Maybe we could have a shouty part there?"

"A shouty part...? Hmm, I don't know. We have a lot of those in _Shrine Maiden_ already." Actually, _Shrine Maiden_ was best described as fifteen minutes straight of Kyouko shouting about whatever was currently on her mind, while Mystia did her best to accompany it on guitar. Each performance was a unique event that would never quite be reproduced, much to the relief of the audience. "Oh! If we did another verse there, we could bridge into the chorus the first time. That would be nice, don't you think?"

"Another verse? Maybe we could have something in there about when people visit the temple and track dirt all over, and I have to sweep it up, and they won't even say hi when I greet them! Maybe." Kyouko frowned down at the paper. "... what rhymes with 'courtyard'...?"

"A-ah, I'll try to think of something...!" Or, rather, Mystia decided, she'd try thinking of a new verse altogether. She always had needed to handle most of the lyric writing.

Before she could make much progress, a voice interrupted her. "Hey, are you open?" A hand pushed the curtains aside, and Mokou stepped inside, followed by a girl that Mystia had never seen before. "Oh, you are, nice."

"Mmhm!" Mystia took the opportunity to inspect the other new arrival. She looked a bit weird even by Gensokyo standards. Brown hair, glasses, a big black hat, and a billowing cape, covered in weird shapes. "Who's this?"

Mokou's answer was entirely drowned out by the girl's. "I'm Sumireko Usami!" she said, and posed, spreading her cape with one hand and pushing her glasses up her nose with the other. "Supernatural investigator and psychic!"

"Huuuuh."

"Supernatural investigator?" Kyouko said. "What's that?"

"It means that I seek out and study the occult, wherever it may be! But, um, not right now. I'm not here on business. I just want some food."

"Yeah, that," Mokou said, and settled down on the far end of the bench from Kyouko. "Sumi is from the outside world. I've been showin' her around. She's the one who was behind all that commotion a few months ago."

"Huh, I see." Mystia only replied to keep the conversation going. She'd been aware that _something_ had happened, but the details were hazy, apart from a lot of her usual customers seeming more tense than usual. These days, she tried to keep her distance from incidents. Getting involved was a good way to get shot at, and getting shot at was bad for business. Having a recent incident-starter at the stand was still a bit too likely to draw Reimu's ire for comfort, but before she could reconsider, well-worn instincts took over. "Well, welcome! Tonight, lamprey skewers are half-off if you're drinking, and the special is croquettes."

Sumireko was only half paying attention. She seemed much more concerned with inspecting the shop. "Huh..." she said. "This all seems pretty normal."

"Eh? What do you mean?"

"When Mokou said we were going to a youkai food stand, I thought it would be, you know." Sumireko raised her hands and wiggled her fingers. Mystia had no idea what this was supposed to represent. "Spooky! A lone light in the middle of unnatural fog or something, and when you get close, an old woman offers you mystery meat and kills you if you refuse! That kind of thing."

"... oh." Mystia frowned as she considered this thought. "That sounds like a terrible business plan, don't you think?"

"I guess," Sumireko conceded, and took a seat next to Mokou, looking disappointed. She adjusted her glasses and squinted at the menu posted on the back wall. "Pretty normal food, too..."

"It's not like I'd take you somewhere that served human or something," Mokou said. "Just give us three skewers each. Sake for me, and a cup of water for the kid."

"Coming right up!" Mystia chirped. Her wings gave a cheery little flick as she started laying the meat out on the grill, and Sumireko leaned forward to peer at her. Mystia tried her best to not pay this any mind, but it grew more difficult as Sumireko reached across the counter and grabbed a wing, rubbing it between her fingertips. That, that forced her to look up from her work. "... what are you doing?"

"I had to make sure they were real!" Sumireko's tone was defensive, but she released the wing and settled back onto the bench. "I've never seen somebody with wings before."

"Well, please don't touch them without asking!" Mystia reached back and fussed over her feathers, not that the touch had actually caused any damage. When she was satisfied, she crouched down to pull two cups from beneath the counter, filled them, and slid them across.

"Thanks," Mokou said, and took a long sip of her sake, followed by a relaxed sigh. "And she's right, Sumi. You shouldn't go around poking youkai. Good way to get your hand bit off."

"Okaaaaay."

With that, the two settled down, and Sumireko didn't seem inclined to start grabbing things again any time soon. Mystia prodded at the meat on the grill, turning it over a few times to ensure it browned evenly. It was routine enough that it let her mind drift back to earlier conversation topics. "Hey, Kyouko?"

"Yeah?"

"I was thinking... In the first verse, what if we dropped the line about shopping and replaced it with something else?"

"Replace it? Huh, maybe. What else rhymes with 'stop,' though?"

"Oh. Um. 'Make our hearts drop'? I guess that doesn't really fit the tone, though."

On the far side of the bench, Sumireko was now watching them intently. Mystia realized that this probably wasn't the best topic to discuss with a human around... but it was too late, and Sumireko used her uncertain glance as an opening to speak up. "Are you writing a song?" she asked.

"We're writing a song!" Kyouko said.

"So, youkai do things like that, too, huh?"

"Uh-huh! We've got a band, and..."

Sumireko scooted closer along the bench, and Kyouko trailed off as she aproached. Sumireko leaned over to glance at the paper. Her eyes slowly widened as she read. " _Eat the Humans_?"

"It's a working title," Kyouko said, her ears drooping.

"It says that you sing, 'eat the humans,' eight times in a row!"

"It's a political song!" Mystia said, and made a snatch for the paper over the counter. It was soon pulled out of her reach, though, as Mokou grabbed it away from all three of them.

Mokou scanned over the lyrics, mumbling to herself past a cigarette that had found its way to her mouth at some point during the fight. "'They smash our stuff, won't let us shop'...?" she read, in a voice of mounting incredulity.

"We got kicked out of like five stores when we were shopping for instruments!" Kyouko said.

"There aren't even five music stores in the village."

"Some of them were candy stores... Lady Byakuren keeps trying to teach me about money, but I can't do the numbers right."

"Uh-huh. Well, anyway, kid," Mokou offered the paper to Mystia, and turned back to Sumireko. "That's just how youkai are. You're gonna have to get used to it if you're going to spend time over here."

"That's right." Mystia snatched the lyrics up with a huff. "Eating people is perfectly natural."

"I don't even eat people. I just thought it sounded cool..." Kyouko mumbled. Her ears were now at full droop, and even her tail seemed to be doing its best to find its way downward.

"Well. I can let it slide this time, in the name of interspecies diplomacy," Sumireko said. "But! In exchange, I want to hear your song."

Kyouko jolted back upright. "... you want to hear it?"

"Uh-huh."

"You really want to?"

"You heard me! A real live youkai music performance! I couldn't call myself a paranormal investigator if I passed up something like that!"

"We can't just play whenever we want," Mystia said, as she loaded the now-cooked lamprey skewers onto a plate. "That song isn't even done yet. Besides, I need to look after my stand."

"There's nobody else here, though. Oh! And!" Sumireko patted at her outfit, and from a pocket, produced a small, colorful box. She gave it a shake toward Kyouko. "If you do, I'll throw in some outside world candy!"

Kyouko's ears perked up, and her tail gave a shake behind her. She shot Mystia a pleading look. "We were gonna practice soon anyway, right...?"

"Yeah, but not because some human told us to." Mystia turned to Sumireko, crossing her arms over her chest. "Besides, we don't have all our stuff here! I only have my guitar!"

"Huh? Do you have amplifiers and stuff too? That's pretty advanced for youkai."

"No!" Mystia had no idea what an amplifier was, but it sounded dangerous. "Our outfits!"

"It's not the same without the clothes," Kyouko agreed.

Sumireko grabbed a lamprey skewer from the plate and waggled it at the pair. "I'll do my best to pretend you're dressed right."

Mystia glared at her over the skewer, but she could see that this was a fight she wasn't going to win. "Fine," she said. "But we'll need a few minutes to get warmed up and stuff."

"Deal," Sumireko said, and took a victorious chomp of the lamprey.

Mystia crouched down behind the counter, and when she rose a few seconds later, an electric guitar was slung over her neck. The guitar was her pride and joy, one of the few things she could truly call her own. Not even Rinnosuke, who had sold it to her, had been able to tell her much about it. She'd spent days learning how to tune it, and even longer experimenting with it to figure out how to produce all the sounds she wanted. It had taken weeks of work, but she was pretty happy with the result.

Unfortunately, she'd barely heard five other guitars in her life, so she only had a general idea of what one was supposed to sound like. She gave the strings a few appraising plucks, and didn't notice the way that Sumireko flinched in response. "Come on, Kyouko," she said, stepping around the counter. "Let's get this over with."

* * *

When the two returned from their impromptu practice almost ten minutes later, Mystia felt a little better about the performance. In the brief time, they'd managed to work out a new verse, she was _pretty_ sure she'd finally gotten the guitar tuned to the exact right spot (she hadn't), and Kyouko had seemed to pick up the lyrics faster than usual.

She'd almost managed to convince herself that she had the situation under control when she noticed that Sumireko had a plastic rectangle pointed at her. "What's that thing?"

"A smartphone!" Sumireko said.

"A smartphone?" Kyouko asked.

"It's an important piece of modern technology." Sumireko pulled her eyes from the screen and gave the two a thumbs up. "I'm going to record your performance. You know, for science! But also for my blog."

"Oh..." Mystia's confidence faltered, and she gave an anxious flick of her wings. "Other people will be able to see it?"

"Mmhm. Try to do a good job!"

Mystia considered this, and decided that an audience was an audience, whether she could see it or not. It meant that the situation demanded a bit more showmanship, though. A brief detour behind the counter produced her sunglasses, and after sliding them on, she already felt better. "In that case!" she said, and gave the guitar an aimless strum. "Me and Kyouko will put on a show that will melt their faces!"

"Melt their faces...!" Kyouko echoed, twice as loud and half as confident.

Mystia turned to face the phone and played a few warmup chords, trying to look as competent as she could. Audience or no, the two had practiced the opening to their shows a few times, and she knew most of the lines by heart. "Listen up!" she shouted at the phone. "We're Choujuu Gigaku, and...!" She dragged her fingers across the strings, producing a sound not unlike a bag full of sick cats, and jabbed a finger at what she was pretty sure was the camera lens. "We're here to make you fear the night!" It had been the band's motto for three weeks now, and Mystia liked the sound of it. Just the right combination of menace and confidence.

"Fear the night!" Kyouko repeated, mirroring Mystia's pose.

"This song's named _Eat the Humans_! It's about, um, the frustration of a youkai's soul!"

"Frustration!"

Mystia gave a firm nod to herself. This wasn't going so poorly, after all. "Right! Ready, Kyouko?"

"Mmhm!"

"Okay then, here goes! Um, one two three four...!" Mystia took one last deep breath, then dove into an energetic opening chord that would have sounded much more impressive if she'd ever heard about the concept of speakers or an amplifier. "They smash our stuff!"

Leaning forward, Kyouko clenched a fist in front of her mouth, in the manner of somebody who was aware of the _concept_ of microphones, but had never seen one in person. "They smash our stuff!" she bellowed, while Mystia played a guitar riff.

"Won't let us shop!"

"WON'T LET US SHOP!"

"Make up dumb rules!"

"Make up dumb rules!"

"Bug us nonstop!"

"Bug us nonstoooop!"

Mystia had already been playing the guitar as quickly as she could, but now started strumming it with all the force she could manage. They both leaned forward now, shouting into Kyouko's clenched fist. "Eat the humans!" they shouted, and Kyouko repeated a shriek of, "Eat the humans!"

"Eat the humans! Gotta eat some humans!"

And Sumireko and Mokou stared on in something that Mystia hoped was awed silence, or at the very least, rightful fear.

* * *

In the end, Sumireko had talked them into playing three songs back to back, with an encore performance of _Mountain Song_ , followed by as much of _Shrine Maiden_ as she could take. Now, Kyouko was bent over the phone, watching raptly as the tiny Mystia onscreen sang, "They taste real good! Scare easy too!"

"Wow..." Kyouko said, and her tail gave a few pleased swishes behind her. "We look so cool!"

"You're definitely something!" Sumireko agreed. With a flick of her finger, she zipped the recording forward a few minutes, to a view of Kyouko bent over double and shouting at her microphone/fist with all the force her little lungs could muster. Sumireko lowered the volume with a few taps of a button, to protect her phone's speakers.

"It would have been nice if we'd been able to put on our music outfits," Mystia said, eyeing the thing from across the counter as she slid her guitar back into its usual storage place beneath the counter. "Don't you think that would have really impressed them?"

"Impressed them? Huh, I guess..." Kyouko said. "Hey, wait! Are lots of people gonna see this?"

"Of course!" Sumireko paused the playback, cutting off Kyouko's shouting voice. With a flick of her wrist, she shifted the phone back into her palm and started idly browsing the recording. "Eighty-nine people read my blog, and I wouldn't think any of them could pass up a real occult performance like this."

"Eighty-nine people...?" Mystia said.

"Well, some of them might be bots, but give or take."

"Is eighty-nine a lot?" Kyouko asked, and stuffed her hands between her thighs to hide the fact that she'd been counting on them.

"Eighty-nine people is four times as many people as our biggest concert," Mystia said, with slowly-dawning amazement. She wasn't sure if she even _knew_ eighty-nine people.

"Yeah, great," Mokou said. She hadn't budged from the same corner of the counter, and had a long-cleaned pile of skewers laying on the plate in front of her. "You know, your food got cold while you were doing all that."

"It doesn't really stick when I eat while astral projecting anyway. I just wanted to investigate youkai cuisine," Sumireko said.

"Your 'investigation' cost eight hundred yen," Mokou grumbled.

"So anyway!" Sumireko turned back to the pair. "I'll let you know if anybody comments on it. If it gets a lot of hits, maybe we can do another sometime?"

"Another?! We've gotta do _Youkai Crusher_ ," Kyouko said. "That's our best song!"

"Maybe _Echoes in my Heart_ too," Mystia said thoughtfully. "To show off our, um, mysterious romantic side too!" It was about as close as their songs got to romantic, at least. It only had one guitar solo, and Kyouko was explicitly forbidden from bellowing during it.

"Hey, hey, I'm not filming it now!" Sumireko said. "Save these ideas for next time, okay?"

"Uh-huh." Mokou slid off of the bench and stuffed her hands into her pockets, then glanced up at the sky. "Anyway, Sumi, do you want to get moving? You left your stuff back at my place, and your wake-up thing's soon, isn't it?"

"It's called an alarm clock," Sumireko said, and frowned down at her phone. "But it's getting close, yeah..." She rose to standing, then spun and leveled a finger at the pair. "Okay! I have to go, but practice and figure out a great show for next time, alright? I'll be expecting an occult performance that will scare my shoes off!"

"R-right!" Kyouko squeaked.

"We'll do our best!" Mystia said. She had started wiping the grill clean, but now paused for long enough to give a light wave to the pair. "Thank you for your business!"

Sumireko gave a satisfied nod at the responses, then turned and hurried after the already-retreating Mokou. Kyouko's tail swished softly behind herself. "Do you think lots of people are going to watch it?"

"W-well, I don't know if it counts if it's just a bunch of outside world humans, but it's about time we got some recognition, huh?"

"Maybe we'll become famous!"

"Hmh." Mystia looked up from cleaning and wiped her hands on a rag, watching the pair disappear into the underbrush. "Yeah! Yeah, we just might!"

* * *

 **Note:** Despite the fic's title, there isn't gonna be a new Choujuu Gigaku song every chapter! But for now...

 **Eat the Humans**  
(Lyrics: Mystia Lorelei and Kyouko Kasodani)

They smash our stuff!  
Won't let us shop!  
Make up dumb rules!  
Bug us nonstop!

(Chorus:)  
Eat the humans! (Eat the humans!)  
Eat the humans! (Gotta eat some humans!)

Won't let us eat!  
Tell us not to shout!  
But in the end!  
We'll take them out!

In the day, they say no way!  
But in the night, they'll run in fright!  
(Chorus x2)

In the day, we've gotta run away!  
But if they stay out late, put 'em on a plate!  
(Chorus x2)

They taste real good!  
Scare easy too!  
The ones who win!  
Will be me and you!

(Chorus x1)

Eat the humans! (x8)


	2. Chapter 2

Mystia hunched over the countertop, tapping an old ballpoint pen against it. In front of her was spread a notebook. It was an ancient, long-used thing, its pages crumpled and splattered with grease stains. It was the only notebook Mystia owned, and she intended to make it last, because Rinnosuke couldn't guarantee that he'd ever get another in stock.

In it, in crooked writing that filled the page and flooded claustrophobically into the margins, was recorded the entire history of her food stand. Every purchase, every sale, every lost yen. Memory had never been a strong point for sparrows, and it reassured her to have something more concrete to fall back on. Math hadn't come naturally either, but she'd set her mind to learning it, squinting at third-hand elementary school primers late into the night and marching into the village to demand lessons from Keine. It had taken a long time, but she liked to think she was good at it. Far better than most youkai, at least. It was a point of pride that, as a bird, it was only natural for her to know a few skills that lesser beasts didn't.

Mystia was good at math, but math wasn't the problem right now. Numbers were. The numbers in front of her were refusing to line up in quite the right way. She trailed the tip of her pen down the page, triple-checking everything for mistakes, but she'd done all the math right. Which meant—

 _WHOMP._ A sack crashed down right atop the notebook, completely breaking her concentration. "Hey, lady!" Cirno's voice shouted from somewhere on the other side of it. "I want to buy food!"

Mystia let out an irritated chirp. She pushed herself up from her seat, until she was high enough to see the short fairy peering up on the other side of the counter. "You don't have to shout!" she said, as her wings gave an irritated flick behind her. Her first instinct was to chase her off—fairies were usually nothing but trouble, and annoying enough to drive off the occasional paying customer—but a glance at her accounting book made her hesitate. "Do you have money?"

"Loads of it!"

"Did you _bring_ money with you?" She had long ago learned to be very clear about such matters when fairies were involved.

"Yep!" Cirno said. She hovered up to stand on the bench and, with a dramatic flourish, opened the sack. Within, it was stuffed nearly to the point of bursting, all with money. Mostly bills, with a handful of coins and the occasional gleam of gold or jewels. It was more money than Mystia had ever seen in one place. It was more money than she'd ever been certain _existed_.

Mystia weighed her next actions for a moment before speaking. "Well," she said. "The shop's open! There's a special deal tonight where lamprey is..." She glanced down to the contents of the bag again. On the top of the heap alone, she could see a few ten thousand yen bills. Hope leapt in her heart. "Two thousand yen per skewer?"

"Hmm..." Cirno frowned at this and turned the bag around to peer inside. "How many zeroes is a thousand?"

"Three."

"Isn't that a lot more money than it used to be...?"

"Hmm? No. That's the normal price," Mystia said, with as much indignity as she could muster. She took a slight sidestep to position herself between Cirno and her menu board, with its treacherous announcement of 'GRILLED LAMPREY SKEWERS: 200 YEN EACH.' "Are you going to buy something, or not?"

Cirno continued looking between Mystia and the sack suspiciously, like she was aware that _something_ was strange about this situation, but couldn't quite pin down what it was. In the end, she gave one last thoughtful scowl at the sack's contents, nodded to herself, and pulled it closed. "I can afford like a zillion of 'em! Hah!" She leaned forward in her chair and jabbed a finger toward Mystia. "Food bird lady! Gimme a zillion lampreys!"

"Coming right up...! Er, you did want me to _cook_ them first, right?"

"Yeah!" Cirno plopped back down onto the bench, and tugged the bag to sit next to her. "And some booze, too!"

"Of course!"

"And mushrooms!"

"Mushrooms aren't in season."

Cirno huffed. "They oughta be."

Mystia hummed to herself as she pulled the lamprey from her icebox. In her head, she was weighing just how much money she might be able to talk Cirno into paying for the meal. That was an awfully large sack, after all. On the other hand, if she asked for too much, Cirno might get suspicious enough to ruin the deal. She'd already agreed to two thousand per skewer, so... give her a plate of lamprey and keep a steady stream of sake flowing to her. With any luck, by the end of the meal, the fairy would be tipsy enough to agree to a twenty thousand yen tab.

It would solve a lot of problems if she did.

When Mystia had first decided to make her food stand, it had taken a lot of preparation and an uncharacteristic amount of focus for a youkai. Learning math had only been part of it. She'd patrolled up and down the riverbanks, cornering fishermen and trappers until she'd found a few who were willing to sell lamprey to a youkai on the side. She'd lurked on the rooftops of the village, spying on restaurants and getting a feel for how they treated customers. Most of all, though, she had needed a cart.

Unlike the other things, it hadn't been something she could get through sheer determination. She wasn't good enough with her hands to build one. There was only a single carpenter in the village that handled such large orders, and he'd refused to work with a youkai. She tried to find one secondhand, but they weren't the sort of thing that passed onto the market very often. So, in the end, she'd turned to the only resource left available to her: the tengu.

Unlike other youkai, the tengu had their own organized society, with their own economy. There were tengu butchers, stoneworkers, printers, map-makers, brewers, and tailors, all coordinated and directed by the great tengu. There were plenty of carpenters, who were more than happy to accept money from a night sparrow. And, for those youkai who didn't have the money on hand, there was a robust and complicated system for loans and credit.

The loan to get a cart was large indeed. Now, another payment on it was due soon, and according to her accounting notebook, she was coming up short. It wasn't a lot—thirty thousand yen or so, a few nights of good business, if she didn't have expenses—but there wasn't anywhere she could pull it from if she wanted to buy enough stock to stay in business after this week.

Which was why it was fortunate that a tiny blue windfall had landed in her lap.

"So," Mystia said, as she laid out the lamprey on the grill. "Where'd a fairy even get so much money, anyway?"

Cirno had been peering at the accounting book, but now perked up. "Oh! A lady paid me for using my lake!"

"Your lake?"

"Yeah! Misty Lake! It's mine, you know. The only ones allowed visiting are other fairies, and, um, the fish people who live underwater, but only because they just swim away if I try to freeze them."

"I didn't know you _could_ own a lake."

"Well, I called dibs on it the last time we had a fairy meeting, and then everybody who argued, I kicked their butts!"

Mystia was now certain that nobody who mattered would recognize this claim, but if it had brought a sack of money walking to her doorstep, she wasn't about to complain. "So this lady believed you and gave you money?"

"Yeah! She was tryin' to fish! But I told her all the fish in there are mine, to practice freezing. She, um, told me to go away at first, but then I started chucking snowballs into the water to scare off all the fish, and I threw her hat into the water when she wasn't looking! After that, she figured out who she was messing with, and said she'd pay me as, um." Cirno had been proudly nodding along with her story, but now stopped and scrunched up her face in concentration. "As... 'penance for unjustly stealing fish from such a distinguished individual.'"

"Huh. I see." The story sounded incredibly unlikely, but... Mystia supposed that any story that ended with a fairy hauling around enough money to feed a family for a year would probably be a bit outlandish. She turned the lamprey on the grill, and once she was satisfied that it was cooking well, pulled out one of her largest glasses and filled it to the brim with sake before sliding it over. "Well, that kind of luck calls for a celebration, right?"

Cirno stared blankly at the glass until her mind put two and two together. "Yeah!" she said. Hefting the glass in both hands, she tilted it back and started gulping down the sake.

* * *

Mystia had to give fairies one thing: They could _eat_. By the time that Cirno started winding down for the evening, she'd put away three plates of lamprey, two dishes of edamame, and a bottle and a half of sake. Mystia was pleased with herself. It was enough to let her revise the tab upward, and more importantly: Cirno seemed rather too intoxicated to protest. Over the course of the evening, the alcohol had taken her from talkative to giggly, and now she'd progressed on to a tired, slightly disoriented, queasy sort of drunk. She was laying against the countertop, with her arms crossed to make a pillow, which she'd buried her face into.

It seemed like a good spot to cut her off. When Cirno showed no sign of touching her plate or drink for a few minutes, Mystia reached across and slid both suggestively away from her. "Will there be anything else?" she asked.

The only response from Cirno was a low gurgling sound.

Mystia pressed on. "Oh, you sound tired. If you're all done for the night, I can figure out your bill."

"Dun wanna eat no more..."

Mystia took that as a yes. She'd had plenty of time to figure out how much to charge, but decided that it would help to make it look more official. So, she pulled her notebook out and spent a few minutes pretending to consider its contents very seriously. When she was satisfied that she'd impressed her sense of duty upon the fairy, she announced, "So, three lamprey plates at six thousand yen apiece, and five glasses of sake at five thousand yen apiece. The edamame," she added, in the most ingratiating voice she could muster, "is free to valued customers like you! Um. That comes out to forty-three thousand yen."

"Wanna go to bed," Cirno groaned.

"As soon as you pay, you can leave!"

Cirno lifted her head from the countertop. The light from the lanterns left her squinting, but she still managed to scowl over at Mystia. She'd already made the regrettable mistake of moving, though, and with an air of resignation, she drunkenly fished around on the ground until her hand found her sack. With a grunt, she hefted it up and flopped it onto the counter.

"Forty-three thousand yen," Mystia hopefully reminded her.

"Ngh." With one hand, Cirno grabbed the base of the sack and hefted it up. The top came open, and out spilled...

Twigs. Twigs and leaves, enough to fill the entire sack. One after another, they cascaded to the countertop, landing in a messy, drifting pile. The flow slowed down, and a few other objects fell from it: a polished fish skull, a few loose ribbons in various colors, some seashells, and a whistle.

But no money.

Mystia stared in horror, and even Cirno seemed to be quickly sobering up as she wrestled with the question of just what had happened. She spun the bag around, staring into its depths and turning it inside out. "There was money in there before!" she shouted.

"Where'd it go...?" Mystia jerked the sack away from Cirno and stuffed her hand all the way inside it, proving that the emptiness wasn't just an illusion. The sack's contents really had been half a kilogram of leaves, twigs, and a little junk. "Where'd it go?!"

"I 'unno!" Cirno dug through the empty bag again, then slapped it down against the countertop in frustration. The motion left a few leaves drifting to the ground, and she glared blearily at Mystia. "Mebbe you shtole it!" she slurred.

"S-stole it?! I'm an honest merchant!" Mystia glanced around the clearing, half hoping to see a thief sneaking off toward the road. As far as she could tell, though, there was nobody for kilometers around. "There has to be some reason..."

"The reason's 'cuz you stole it!"

"I didn't steal it!"

"You stole it." Cirno had slumped against the counter again, and was communicating entirely in groans. "You stole it..."

Mystia ignored her, as her mind raced to find any hint to the missing money. She, quite literally, couldn't afford to drop the issue. "Nobody but us was here, right?"

Cirno gave a grunt that could have been affirmation, or could have just been nausea.

Mystia turned the sack over in her hands again, but it really did look like a normal sack. Nothing that would, say, let a fairy sneak all the money out without her noticing. "The lady who gave you the money," she said. "What'd she look like?"

"'m gunna throw up..."

"Just tell me what she looked like!"

Cirno squinted up against the light again, then slumped against the countertop, her cheek smushed against it, and frowned in concentration. "Dunno. She had... a fishin' pole..."

"I could have guessed that! Something that would help us find her!" Even if it didn't provide a clue, Mystia reasoned, maybe somebody who had parted with a fortune so easily once might do it again.

"'unnoooo..." Cirno trailed off, and this time, Mystia didn't press for more details, because some unpleasant gurgling sounds were coming from the fairy's stomach. "Fuzzy ears," she said, when it was all over.

"The lady had fuzzy ears?"

"Mhm."

"What kind of fuzzy ears?"

Cirno shot her a very can't-you-see-I'm-dying sort of glare, but raised one hand and rested it against the side of her head. It stuck out at an unlikely-looking angle, but got across the general idea of an ear. "Pointy ones." As she let her hand fall limp to her side again, she let out a sound along the lines of 'rnj,' which Mystia figured probably meant 'orange.'

Fuzzy, pointy, orange ears. That narrowed it down some. It would be some kind of beast youkai, and that meant somebody she could deal with as an equal, probably. A bakeneko, maybe. Or an odd-colored tanuki. Or, if she were unlucky, a kasha. Or...

"Did the lady have a tail?"

"Dun wanna answer more dumb questions."

"Just this one and we're finished."

Cirno huffed. "Fluffy one."

Mystia tensed up, her eyes widening, and her cheeks darkened in an outraged flush. Her fingers curled against her sides as her hands balled into fists. "Y-you dumb fairy! You took money from a kitsune!"

"Huh?" Cirno pushed herself up again and squinted over at her. "W-what'd I do?!"

"You took money from a kitsune! It's fake! That's what they _do!_ "

"How'm I s'posed to know that?!"

"Everybody knows that! She just gave you fake money to get you to go away because you're an annoying fairy!"

"No, you're—" Cirno jabbed a finger accusingly toward Mystia, only for the force to send her wobbling on the bench. She ended up sliding off of it, left standing and glowering at her across the countertop. " _You're_... 'nnoyin'."

"No, _you're_ annoying!" Mystia squirmed in outraged tension, until her mind offered up an outlet for it. Snatching up the sack, she grabbed the handful of leftover lamprey skewers and shoved them into it. Then, bundling the whole thing closed, she hurled it at Cirno.

In her current condition, Cirno had nowhere near the reflexes to catch it. The bag impacted harmlessly against her chest, and fell to the ground. "Wuh...?"

"Take it! Take all the rest of them and go!" Mystia crossed her arms and turned to face away. "Might as well! I'm going to go out of business! Dumb fairy!" Well, she would have been out of business either way, but having her salvation snatched away at the last moment wasn't easing the pain at all. Nor did it help that she'd stuffed three normal customers worth of food into Cirno in the hopes of getting a return.

Behind her, Mystia could hear Cirno making a production of leaving, huffing and stomping her feet and grumbling under her breath. Once she was certain the fairy was gone, she scrubbed the grill and started packing up for the night.


	3. Chapter 3

Six thousand, two hundred, and ninety yen.

The number was burnt into Mystia's brain. She had calculated her finances half a dozen times the night before, worrying over page after page of numbers, and she'd always arrived at the same answer: As of this morning, she was short six thousand, two hundred, and ninety yen.

Her payment was due tomorrow afternoon.

In the past few days, she'd tried everything she could think of to raise the extra cash. Apart from the failed attempt to squeeze a little extra out of Cirno, she'd had a few emergency sales. Half-off sake night had seemed like a good way to get extra customers... until a dozen people showed up to drink without ordering much food. Buy-one-get-one lamprey skewers had sounded like a good deal to _her_ , but it hadn't seemed to draw in anybody but her regular customers. In one final act of desperation, last night she'd set her cart up as close to the human village as she dared, within sight of the main road in and out of the place. She'd barely been singing for an hour when a group of humans had showed up to kindly suggest, while brandishing weapons, that it would probably be a good idea for her to move her cart very far away.

So, here she was. Six thousand, two hundred, and ninety yen short.

Six thousand, two hundred, and ninety yen.

It was raining tonight. This, of course, usually meant far fewer customers.

It seemed appropriate.

So, Mystia laid out over the counter, without even bothering to turn the grill on. She'd lit the lanterns, but doubted that anybody could see them from more than a hundred meters away. She hadn't seen anybody since she'd opened for the night, let alone made a sale. The rain beat steadily on the roof of the stand, and she hummed a glum, disjointed song along with it.

Somebody landed just in front of the stall in a white blur of speed. Mystia didn't even bother to look up, but drawled out a halfhearted, "Welcooooome."

"Hey, hey. It's really coming down, huh?"

It took a moment for Mystia's brain to place the voice as Aya Shameimaru. If it had been almost anybody else, she would have been comfortable ignoring them. A crow tengu demanded a bit more decorum, though. She hurriedly pushed herself off the counter and tried to look busy. "A-ah, welcome...!" she repeated, as she scrubbed a rag over the entirely clean grill. "Tonight's special is, um...!" She hadn't even bothered to decide on one. Actually, she'd skimped on stock to make up some of her budget shortfall, so she couldn't offer much in the way of specials. "... lamprey!"

"The special is lamprey? Doesn't that seem kind of predictable?" Aya said, as she ducked under the awning. She was soaked, but it was the sort of thing that anybody who flew for transportation got used to sooner or later. "On a night like this, it ought to be something like warm sake, don't you think?"

"Oh! Yes! That's a good idea! I'll keep it in mind for next time...!" Not that there was likely to be a next time, at this rate.

Aya shook some water off and took a seat at the bench. Mystia fumbled through an attempt to start her firebox and fretted about what to do next.

There was an order to being a bird youkai in Gensokyo. A hierarchy. Mystia dwelled at the very bottom, with the other beast youkai. They were all animals who had lived too long, or built up just enough of a legend to develop into something more. Most of them were uneducated and only just aware enough of Gensokyo's social mores to keep themselves from getting exterminated. Mystia was proud of being smarter and more successful than that, but she had to admit, this was the rung where she fell.

Next were the assorted youkai birds, those who were born as youkai. The hell ravens and phoenixes. Most of them weren't too bright, but they were innately supernatural. It gave them an edge in power, it put them ahead of Mystia's kin.

Finally, there were the crow tengu. They weren't just powerful compared to the other bird youkai. They were powerful compared to _anybody_. Their warriors could fearlessly take on youkai hunters, they had a level of education and organization that made the humans look backward, and they knew it. Most of them were beacons of confidence, tall and proud, wearing sharp clothes and with magical wonders in their pockets.

Crow tengu were at the very top of the (sometimes literal) pecking order. Next to them, with her stubby wings and grease-spattered dress, Mystia had always felt very small and unimportant.

If she was honest with herself, it was part of why her failure hurt so badly. The tengu had been very patronizing when she'd gone to get her loan, almost transparently condescending in the praise they heaped on her. 'A business, selling lamprey!' they'd said. 'That's very ambitious for a sparrow! You must be quite the smart one, hm?'

She had wanted to prove them wrong. So much for that. Beast youkai probably weren't cut out for this kind of thing anyway, she told herself. Keeping track of the numbers had always been really hard for her, so it only made sense that numbers would be the thing to do her in. She'd stick to more appropriate stuff after this. Nothing to do but sing in the night and attack people. Like she was meant to do, probably.

"Hummm..." Aya's voice snapped her out of her haze of self-pity. "What's good tonight?"

Mystia glanced back at her icebox and tried to remember what she had left. Her memory was admittedly unreliable, but it said 'not much.' "I, um, I suggest the lamprey."

"The old standby, huh? Sounds good, sounds good... give me a lamprey plate, then. Do you have tea?"

"Mmhm."

"Then I'll have some tea, too. Gotta have something to warm up the bones on a night like this, right?"

"Ah, okay...!" Mystia did have to admit, some warmth sounded nice. Laying around in her misery, she hadn't realized how cold it was. It was one of those nights where the humidity clung to her like a coat, making her feel wet and clammy.

The first embers glowed on the charcoal, and she pushed the pan back under the grill. "It will be a few minutes, sorry."

"It's okay. Nowhere else to go in weather like this, right?"

Mystia nodded and stirred the charcoal, helping the embers get more air. They slowly crackled to life, and the sound of popping sparks mixed with the drone of rain. Once she was satisfied that they could take care of herself, she took a step back, and the two stood in silence for a minute.

Part of Mystia's mind decided to calculate Aya's tab so far. A lamprey plate and tea was seven hundred yen, barely even a dent in the side of her oncoming debt. A much larger part of her was insistently connecting the dots. It was almost time for her payment to the tengu, and here a tengu was visiting her shop on a night when nobody had any reason to be outdoors...

"So, um," Mystia said, as casually as she could. "You have something for me, right?"

"Eh? Don't you think that's a strange question to ask somebody out of the blue?"

"But you do."

"I do, yeah." Aya plucked a small envelope from her pocket and held it up between two fingers. "... expecting it?"

"I guess you could put it like that." Mystia slid the envelope out of Aya's fingers. A moment ago, she'd been so resolute, ready to just snatch the envelope up and read the news. In its own way, it would be a relief. Now... she couldn't quite bring herself to move. She stood there, holding it in both hands and staring at the block letter 'MYSTIA LORELEI' on the label.

It was just a dumb envelope, she told herself. She even already knew what was in it. Here, with a tengu watching her, she could at least face her fate with dignity.

Mystia slipped one fingernail beneath the top flap and dragged it across, slicing the paper. The edge of a printed character caught her eye, and she anxiously averted her gaze. She couldn't let herself see this in bits and pieces. She had to face it all in one go.

Her fingernail reached the other side of the envelope, and she pulled the paper out. It was thick, official-feeling stuff. She'd never noticed on the previous bills. It felt appropriate.

Taking a deep breath, she unfolded it.

 **MYSTIA LORELEI** , the message began, in blocky letters that some apprentice she'd never met had probably read off of a form.

 **MYSTIA LORELEI,**  
 _In pursuance of the agreement between yourself and the Tengu Nation on the 10th of Hazuki, Season 120, your semi-annual payment is now due. Below, we have taken the liberty of calculating the appropriate payment. Remittance must be submitted by sunset on the day following the delivery of this notification, and you are encouraged to send it with the courier who has delivered it. Should you fail to pay by the designated time..._

Mystia skimmed onward, to a tidy column of numbers that listed the entire history of her debt. A large initial sum at the top, with small additions for interest. Payments steadily whittled it down until it reached the bottom of the page. _Your next payment,_ the page read, _will be 76,500 yen. If you wish to dispute this amount, please contact..._

Mystia's payment was due tomorrow. In her lock box, she knew, she had seventy thousand two hundred ten yen. She was six thousand, two hundred, and ninety yen short.

She was bitterly pleased to see that she'd correctly calculated the total, with six months of interest, down to the individual yen.

"I got the short end of the stick," Aya said, oblivious to the drama that was unfolding inside of Mystia's head. "Mention that you're heading down the mountain on a night like this and suddenly every assignment below the treeline is yours."

Mystia gave a soft, noncommittal noise.

"What's it say?"

"Just a bill..."

"Ehh?" Aya leaned over the counter and eyed the paper. "Ohh, you can't pay, huh?"

It was like a knife to her chest. "How did you—?!" Mystia caught herself and swallowed her panic. Folding the letter with trembling hands, she said, "U-um, what do you mean?"

"Well, you look like you you're about to have a heart attack. Nothing escapes a trained reporter's eye, you know." Aya tapped her face, right below her left eye, and settled back onto the bench. "What's the damage?"

"Um?"

"I mean, how much do you owe?"

Mystia had no idea where this was going. Under normal circumstances, she'd never give away such information, especially not to Gensokyo's most notorious gossip. Right now, well, she didn't see the harm. Everything felt like it was a bad dream anyway. "About six thousand yen..." she murmured.

Aya interlaced her fingers beneath her chin and nodded thoughtfully at this. "Gimme a drink?"

"Huh?"

Aya clucked her tongue. "Don't you know that you should always say yes when a pretty girl asks for a drink?"

Mystia stared at her in blank incomprehension for a few seconds, then shrugged. Again, there was no reason to turn her down. One glass of sake wasn't going to make any difference in her fortunes at this point. Maybe Aya would even be doing her a favor by disposing of it. She opened a bottle and filled a glass, then slid it numbly across the counter.

"Thanks," Aya said. Reclining with the glass, she took a sip, then shook her head. "Ahh, this would be perfect if it were just warm. It's a shame. Real shame."

Mystia didn't have much to say to that. Below, the firebox was now crackling, sending waves of heat rising up from the grill's surface. Lacking anything better to do with her time, she retrieved a few lamprey skewers and laid them out on it. Soon, their sizzling was louder than even the rain.

"So," Aya said. "Six thousand yen, huh?"

"Yeah..."

"Except now you've sold me a glass of sake. That's..." Aya glanced at the menu board. "Two hundred yen. So now it's only fifty-eight hundred."

Mystia didn't have the heart to point out that six thousand was just her rounded estimate, and the full difference was still over six thousand yen. It didn't make a difference either way. "I guess so."

"Plus the lamprey. That's another six hundred, right?"

Mystia didn't reply.

"Brings it down to fifty- _two_ hundred."

"Do you have a point?"

"Just making small talk!" Aya said, in that same conversational tone. "Have you had any interesting guests lately?"

Aya's glibness was starting to get on Mystia's nerves. It was a stark contrast to her own mood. She almost wanted to stay quiet just to spite her, but she decided that if this was all some elaborate method for tormenting her, she'd give Aya enough leeway to make it obvious. At least then she could feel good about hating all tengu for the rest of her life. "A few," she said. "There was a human from the outside."

"An outsider...? Oh! Sumireko?" Aya spread her arms at her sides. "With the cape?"

"Yeah. She made me and Kyouko sing for her."

"Oho. She's a big news item right now, you know. Really big." Aya let her arms relax to her side again. "Good enough to pay, if you'll give me all the details. Usually, I'd pay about five hundred yen for a lead like that. That would make it forty-seven hundred, yeah?"

Mystia ignored her. "That fairy Cirno was here, too. She got tricked into taking fake money from a kitsune and had a bunch of sake to celebrate." The fact that Mystia had _urged_ her into drinking the sake, and that she'd almost been tricked into accepting it herself, didn't seem important enough to merit mentioning.

"Oh, a human interest piece. Those are really popular with the readers these days. I'll pay five hundred for that one too."

Again, Mystia ignored her, and turned the lamprey over. She'd neglected it for long enough that one side was lightly charred. A slight affront to her abilities as a cook, but not something she was going to get concerned about right now.

Aya pressed on. "With that, you've made eighteen hundred yen tonight. That's a third of your shortfall already!"

Mystia had thought Aya had been trying to cheer her up, but this was just too much. For this tengu to barge in here and act like she had all of her problems figured out, like her problems were that _easy_ to figure out, like she hadn't already spent three nights bent over her accounting book and searching for ways to juggle her funds around to cover the payment... Mystia's wings bristled. "And the other two-thirds?" she chirped sharply. "Do you think I'm going to get more paying customers on a night like this?!"

"Ah, well." Aya said, with an infuriating calmness. She rocked back on the bench and swirled her drink thoughtfully. "It seems to me..."

"Get on with it, you windbag!"

Aya smirked at this. She took a sip of her sake, then rested it on the counter, moving with a quite deliberate slowness. "It seems to me that a place like this gets a lot of interesting visitors. Half of Gensokyo's gotten drunk here, right? People say some pretty interesting things when they're drunk."

"What's that have to do with anything?"

"I'm thinking of making you an offer, as head of the Bunbunmaru newspaper. Nothing much, just keep tabs on your customers and let me know about anything interesting you hear. Sounds easy, right?"

"I guess..." Mystia said, restraining herself from bringing up the more pressing matter of, _I can't give you news from the stand if I can't afford to run the stand._

"So! You agree to be my, my _field agent_ , giving me whatever interesting stuff you hear, and I'll pay you ten thousand yen a year. You know, a retainer. Starting today, and on top of the meal, of course."

Mystia's heart froze in her chest. "Ten thousand yen...?"

"Ten thousand yen."

Something in her head numbly slid the numbers together. Ten thousand yen for the retainer, plus eighteen hundred for the meal... Eleven thousand eight hundred yen. She could make the payment, and still have enough left over to buy supplies for next week. "You'd pay me ten thousand yen just for that?"

"Well, it's a bit more than I'd normally pay, but you've got a nice little operation here! I can probably get an article or two a month from it. Besides—" Aya grabbed her drink and drained it, then let out a sigh of satisfaction at the end. She smiled over to Mystia. "Consider it a favor. If you closed down now, somebody would just start selling yakitori to take up the slack, and nobody wants that."

"A-ah, that would be pretty annoying."

"Right! An affront to all of bird-kind, that's what it is. But you! Down here, beating the humans at their own game, and selling good wholesome lamprey, which doesn't hurt anybody? Well, except the lamprey youkai, but there aren't many of them." Aya cleared her throat. "A lot of us are cheering for you, you know?"

"Really...?"

"Really! Ah, that is, I haven't _asked_ , but I'm sure other crow tengu would approve if they knew about it. It's the principle of the thing. If you went out of business, it would make us all look bad. You're doing a public service down here. Real beacon of the community! "

"Well..." Mystia wasn't sure what a beacon was, but it sounded very impressive. She'd meant to show humans a better alternative to eating chicken, sure, but she'd never realized that she was a pioneer, battling for the dignity of birds everywhere. Thinking about it like that, she couldn't help but puff up with a little pride. "I'm doing my best!"

"Yeah! Keep up the good work."

"And this will help a lot...! Thank you!"

"My pleasure, my pleasure."

"I really appreciate it, though!"

"It's nothing! Just making an investment in an up-and-coming business!"

"Even so, I...!"

"Hey, uh, Mystia?"

"Y-yeah?"

"The food is burning."

Through the tail end of the conversation, Mystia now realized, a certain hissing and a harsh smell had been registering just below the level of her consciousness. Looking over at the grill, she was met with a cloud of hazy smoke. "Ah!" She grabbed her fan and waved it away. "Aaah!" When the smoke was thin enough for her to see without her eyes watering, she snatched the lampreys off the grill.

The side of the meat that had been in contact with the grill was now blackened to a crisp. The smell was unbearable. The lampreys' many eyes glared accusingly up at her.

Three lampreys gone. Another six hundred yen, gone forever. Fortunately, now she could afford the mistake. "... sorry."

"Ahh, don't be. I'm in no rush." The rain washed the smoke out of the air, and within a few seconds, Mystia could breathe again. Aya leaned over, and pushed a small pile of bills across the counter. "Here. That should cover everything."

After sitting the burnt lamprey aside, Mystia flipped through them. Eleven thousand eight hundred yen. Enough to cover the rest of her bill. It would still leave her finances pretty tight for a while, but... now that she had six more months before she had to worry about the prospect of tengu collectors breathing down her neck, she could find ways to deal with that.

A tension that she hadn't even been aware of drained out of her body, and for the first time in a week, Mystia felt like she could breathe normally. She clasped her hands in front of herself and bowed so deeply that her head dipped beneath the counter. "Um, really, though! Thank you."

"Don't worry about it," Aya said, waving the apology away. "But, I'm going to expect a lot out of you! The Bunbunmaru's got pretty high standards, you know!"

"You can count on me!" After tucking the money away, Mystia pulled three more lampreys out of her icebox and laid them out on her cutting board. As she started sliding a skewer into one, she said, "Um, so, while you're here anyway, do you want to hear the recent rumors I can remember?"

Mystia would swear that she didn't see Aya's hands move, but in the blink of an eye, her notebook was spread out in front of her and a pen was in her hands. "Sure, if you'd like."

Mystia's wings flicked thoughtfully as she skewered another lamprey. "Well," she said. "A few weeks ago, Marisa was by here. It sounded like she'd snuck into that big tomb in the graveyard and carried off everything that wasn't nailed down..."

And Aya began writing.


	4. Chapter 4

For the newest (second) employee of the Bunbunmaru Newspaper, Aya had left behind a notebook.

It was a notebook for Mystia to write down the news scoops she would undoubtedly encounter. It was a tengu notebook, of course. It was tightly, precisely bound. When she opened it, the spine made a satisfying, crisp sound, and it smelled like wood and flowers. On the front, in elegant calligraphy, it said, 'NOTES.' A silky red ribbon extended from the top of the spine, and while Mystia wasn't sure what this was for, it looked very fancy. The paper was white as snow, and so smooth and supple that she wanted to rub her cheek against it. It came with a pen, a precise little piece of machinery that made a sharp, officious _click_ when she pressed the button.

Mystia's other notebook, the one she kept her financial records in, was crumpled and stained. It smelled like grease and lampreys. She hadn't been ashamed of it before, but she realized now that she should have been.

On the front page of the new notebook, she'd started keeping a list of every patron that she served. It currently said:

Mokou X  
Sanae X  
Marisa XX  
Fairies? -XX  
Kagerou XX  
Sekibanki X  
Mokou X  
Other Humans XXXXX  
Reisen X

It represented four nights of sales. Four pretty good nights, apart from the two times that fairies had stolen from her. What it didn't represent, though, was much news. Marisa had cajoled Sanae into having a drink, and Sanae had launched into a long rambling anecdote about wars and machines. Reisen had complained about her job for an hour. Sekibanki had complained about humans for an hour. Nothing that would make for much of a story.

After four days without a scoop, she was starting to feel anxious. Aya hadn't set a quota for her, but she still felt obligated to deliver for the tengu who had saved her business. So, Mystia frowned down at the notebook, tapping her new pen against it thoughtfully as she tried to string together a story from the checkmarks in front of her. The story Sanae had told her would almost be newsworthy, if she could just figure out what a liquid snake was and why Sanae would fistfight one...

Her train of thought was interrupted by a hand pushing aside one of the flaps outside the customer area.

"Hello!" somebody announced from the other side. It was a tone of voice that sounded entirely too pleased just to have the opportunity to say, 'hello.' It made Mystia instantly suspicious.

Her suspicions were confirmed when the voice's owner stepped through the curtain. She was entirely too overdressed for the occasion, with a dress that looked practically antique, a gauzy shawl wrapped over her shoulders, a few pieces of jewelry, and an ornate hairpin. Her hair was held up in a pair of elaborate loops. Serving a late-night crowd by definition, Mystia was used to most of her customers looking a bit bedraggled and plain. This one, on the other hand, looked like her outfit was worth more than everything that Mystia owned combined.

More concerning was the fact that a dead girl shambled in behind her, her arms outstretched.

The woman smiled expectantly. The corpse gurgled. Mystia looked between the two and weighed her options.

"Um," she said. "Hello?"

If the woman noticed her reluctance, she didn't show it. She leaned over to the dead girl and gave her a coaxing pat on the back. "Yoshika, dear, say hello."

The corpse focused uncertainly on Mystia. She frowned in concentration. Then, she groaned, "Hell-loooooooo!"

"Good girl, good girl!" The woman patted Yoshika's head enthusiastically, as if she were the world's least hygienic lapdog. Yoshika beamed in accomplishment.

"Hello..." Mystia repeated. Under the circumstances, it seemed like the best thing to do was to carry on as if one of her customers wasn't a walking corpse. "Er. Tonight's special is free sake with an order of a lamprey combo."

"Hmm? Oh, no, we're not here to buy food," the woman said. From somewhere, she produced a business card and offered it over. Mystia took it.

"Seiga Kaku," the woman said. "Professional hermit. It's nice to meet you."

It was just as well that she introduced herself, since Mystia was still trying to make sense out of the surname printed on the card. "... okay."

"And I'd like to talk to you about..." Seiga raised a rolled-up newspaper and gave it a knowing waggle, as if its presence was supposed to mean something to Mystia, then spread it out on the countertop. "This."

Mystia leaned in to glance over the paper.

It was an issue of the Bunbunmaru. The top half of the page was mostly filled with a photograph of Marisa, standing in the doorway of what was presumably her house and talking glibly to whoever had taken the photo. Through the doorway behind her, heaps of junk could be seen.

The headline read, 'MAGICIAN CONFESSES TO RAIDING TAOIST TOMB.'

"According to this," Seiga said, in a tone that suggested it was the most interesting thing she'd ever read, "Marisa stole some things from the tomb under the graveyard, and she stopped by here to talk about it afterward."

"She stopped by here? Does it say that?"

"Ah, you're right, it doesn't! I'm sorry. It says that all of this information came from a 'secret informant.' And that's you!"

Mystia stiffened up, fidgeting with her cleaning rag. "Well, 'secret informant' means that nobody actually knows who it is, doesn't it?"

"Oh, well, yes. That's why I asked the tengu who writes the paper! She was very helpful."

 _So much for '_ _secret_ _'..._ Mystia drooped. "Well... she did stop by here on her way home, yeah. What about it?" She glanced to Yoshika. Graverobbing, a walking corpse... it all made sense now. "Oh! Did the stuff that she stole belong to this girl?"

"Hmm? Oh, Yoshika? No, no, not at all! Can you imagine? She'd probably try eating them, the silly thing." The woman reached over to ruffle Yoshika's hair again. Yoshika gave a groan that could have been satisfaction, or could have just been gasses escaping. "No, the treasures in that tomb belonged to me and my allies."

"So _you're_ dead."

"I'm a hermit!" Seiga declared proudly. "I might have spent a few centuries in a tomb, but that was only a short nap. Would somebody dead look this good?"

Mystia declined to comment. Before she could form a reply, a rather distinct crunching noise drew her attention. She glanced to the side. "... stop eating the plates!"

"Ah, Yoshika, dear..." Seiga stepped over and looped an arm around Yoshika, then used her other hand to fish what remained of the plate out of her mouth. "You can't eat these."

"I'm sorry," Yoshika groaned. Flecks of glass fell from her lips.

"She's just a little peckish, I'm afraid," Seiga said, as if this were a perfectly normal thing. She offered the half-eaten plate over with a warm smile.

Noting the gleam of saliva on it, Mystia elected to wrap a cloth around her hand before grabbing it, and dropped it into the trash. "... thanks."

"It's fine, it's fine! I apologize for the inconvenience. We do have the good fortune to be at a food stall, after all. Could we please have, hmm, three lamprey plates and a bottle of sake?"

"Should I put them all together, or does she want to eat more plates?" Mystia asked sarcastically.

"Oh, no, food is fine too. My cute jiang-shi can digest anything, can't she?"

"Glurghf," Yoshika replied.

"... right." Mystia crouched down to pull nine lamprey skewers from the icebox. She took the opportunity to gather her wits and try to come up with a plan of action. Three plates was more sales than she'd made to a single customer in weeks, which would certainly help her budget recover, but she was still hoping for this to be over soon. When dealing with the type of customers who ate the dinnerware, the best course of action was probably to satisfy them as quickly as possible and get them out the door.

"So!" she said, as she straightened back up and put the lamprey onto the grill. "Marisa did come by here a few days ago! She had a sack of things that she said she'd taken from the tomb. She didn't stick around for long, so she didn't tell me much. The interview in the paper probably has more information than I do."

"Oh, I see!" Seiga said. "And did she show you what she'd stolen?"

"Not really... are you looking for something in particular?"

"A vase." Seiga held up her hands to demonstrate the size. "It contained some very valuable materials for making elixirs."

"I didn't see anything like that..."

"But it was in the tomb a few weeks ago, and now it's missing. It stands to reason that Marisa took it, doesn't it?"

"Sure, that makes sense."

"And I assume that you're familiar with Marisa's house?"

"Huh? Um, yeah, I know where it is."

"Wonderful! Then would you be a peach and help me get it back?"

"... h-huh?" Mystia froze, halfway through flipping a skewer. "I'm not really sure if I could do anything about an issue like that..."

"Oh, it shouldn't be too hard! I'll just need a little help from you."

"I don't know..."

"I really do need those ingredients for my elixirs, and some of them are far too rare to find elsewhere on such short notice. Poor Yoshika here will start decaying in a few weeks without the right balms. I need to make one every now and then to maintain my youth, myself."

"I have to watch my stand tonight."

Seiga studied her face for a moment, and her ever-present smile slowly faded. "Of course," she said with a nod. "I understand. I wouldn't want to trouble you."

Mystia looked away, and thankfully found that the lamprey skewers were done. It was a welcome distraction. She piled them onto the plate, opened a bottle of sake, and slid the two across the counter. "Order's up."

"Here we go, Yoshika," Seiga said, lifting one of the skewers and waggling it in front of Yoshika's face. "Make sure to eat a lot. If you're well-fed now, it will take you longer to start decaying."

"'kaaaaaay."

Yoshika took a bite. The distinct sound of a wooden skewer being chewed hung in the air for a few seconds until she swallowed.

Mystia grabbed a cup from behind the counter and pretended to wipe it with a rag to give her an excuse to look away. The whole predicament had left her feeling uncomfortable to begin with, and she wasn't really in the mood for her usual chatting with her customers. Well, custom _er_. Yoshika didn't seem like the talkative sort.

"Poor dear," Seiga said, as she fed the rest of the skewer into Yoshika's mouth then tugged her fingers back to avoid getting them eaten. "Dead for years, and now that you've gotten a second chance, you're just going to die again..."

Mystia started rubbing the glass more quickly.

"It's okay, though. Without my elixirs, I suppose that I'll be joining you soon enough. We can keep each other company in the hells."

Mystia's grip on the glass tightened until she imagined that she could hear it cracking between her fingers.

"I'm told that one of the yamas takes kindly to hermits, so maybe we can get off with only a few centuries of flogging..."

"Lady!" Mystia chirped, her wings giving a flick behind her. "If you're trying to guilt trip me into helping you, you can forget it!"

"Oh my, is that what it sounded like? I'm so sorry! I can see how you might get that impression, though." Seiga gave Mystia an expression like a bag of drowning puppies, then turned to Yoshika. "Yoshika, dear, grab the food so that we don't have to bother this nice lady anymore."

"Fooood," Yoshika drawled. She scooped the entire collection, plates and all, into her arms. Seiga provided a cloth sack from somewhere, and Yoshika dropped the whole lot into it.

"You still haven't paid!" Mystia said, when Seiga started turning away. "And those are my plates!"

"Oh, of course! How silly of me." Seiga turned back and produced a coin purse, then started slowly counting out her tab. "I might forget my own head if it weren't attached."

Mystia didn't say anything.

"Please, don't worry about us, either," Seiga continued conversationally. "I'm sure that Yoshika and I will manage somehow."

Mystia stayed quiet and kept her eyes on the coins in case Seiga tried anything.

"I have to admit, though, I'm a bit disappointed, after everything the lady at the newspaper said about you..."

Mystia paused and looked up. "Um? What did she say?"

"Oh, nothing but praise! She said that you're brave, conscientious, intelligent, and, well, I'm sure you get the idea. I'd thought for sure that you might be able to help us after that. Ah well."

Mystia sat in stunned silence. Aya had said she was brave? And consci—okay, honestly, she didn't have much of an idea of what 'conscientious' meant. But intelligent? Aya, a tengu, had called her _intelligent_?

Mystia's entire face was rapidly turning red. Seiga's smile grew, and she continued. "Although, I'm sure that a reporter like her has plenty of contacts. Maybe she could recommend somebody else to help me."

Seiga continued, but Mystia was off in her own world now. Aya had practically _recommended_ her for this job. The first time she'd ever gotten an actual compliment from a tengu, and now she was going to fail to live up to it? She could just imagine how those other tengu would react when word got around. And plus, it was _Aya_ , and in a way, if she thought about it, helping Seiga to get her stolen stuff back was practically a good deed, and—

"I'll do it," Mystia said.

"Hmm? I'm sorry, what was that?"

"I-I'll do it!" she repeated, more loudly.

"Oh, wonderful!" Seiga reached across the counter and gave her hands a warm squeeze. "I was sure that we could count on you!"

"Right, yeah...! I mean! You just need somebody to lead you to Marisa's house, right?"

"Hmm? No, no, I know where her house is. I need somebody to keep watch while I go inside and look for my missing vase!" Seiga hummed to herself, seeming oblivious to the look of mounting horror on Mystia's face. "Now then, it will be dawn in a few hours," she said, as she guided Mystia around the counter. "So we really should get moving."

* * *

The Forest of Magic was dark. It was a new moon, leaving only the stars and the occasional firefly to provide some light. Marisa's cottage was just barely visible as a black rectangle, slightly lighter than the black everything-else around it. Seiga had wasted in time in walking right up to its back wall and sliding the hairpin out of her hair.

"So, um," Mystia said, "the plan is to go in there and steal your vase?"

"That's right!" Seiga said, in a sing-song voice. She was tracing a slow, careful circle on the wall with her hairpin. Mystia wasn't sure what this was supposed to accomplish, but it seemed a bit late to start asking questions.

"In the middle of the night."

"Mmhm."

"To steal stuff from a youkai hunter."

"That's the plan."

Seiga finished drawing her circle, and the wall parted noiselessly into a round hole. Beyond it, Mystia could see nothing but vague shadows in the low light. Some situations were too creepy for even a youkai. "So you just need me to... stay out here, right?"

"Oh, yes, that's the idea! You have the most important job of all. Yoshika?" Seiga held out a hand, and Yoshika handed over the sack of food, which Seiga then offered over to Mystia. "You need to stand guard and hold our food."

"You need me to hold your food?"

"That's right. I just need you to stand out here and hold this."

Mystia eyed the sack in confusion. "Why did you put your food in a sack, anyway? Why'd you even have a sack in the first place? Couldn't your zombie just hold it?"

"She's a jiang-shi," Seiga said, ignoring most of Mystia's questions. "And she needs to leave before we start. Jiang-shi are terrible at sneaking, I'm afraid." She patted Yoshika's shoulder. "Yoshika dear, you can head home, okay? I'll be back soon."

"Okayyyyyy," Yoshika drawled, as she ambled off into the underbrush.

"Right..." Mystia reached out and grabbed the sack, then gave it an appraising heft. "Hold a sack. I think I can handle that."

"Perfect. I should only need your help for a few minutes."

Right. It was a weird request, but Seiga seemed like a pretty weird person, so that only made sense. And if she turned back now...

Mystia could just imagine _that_ news getting back to Aya. _'Ah, it's fine, it's fine! I should've known better than to recommend a sparrow for something, anyway.'_

That settled it. Mystia gave a firm nod and slung the sack over her shoulder. "I understand! You can count on me...!" she chirped.

"Wonderful! Please wait here."

Seiga flashed her one last smile, then ducked into the hole in the walla. Within seconds, she'd disappeared into the darkness beyond. Soon, even her footsteps had faded into the distance, and Mystia was once again alone in the night. Not that being alone in a forest at night was a particularly unsettling situation for a night sparrow, but it still left her a bit uncertain what to do.

A few minutes passed. Something deep inside the cottage gave a thump. Mystia shifted from foot to foot.

A bit more time passed. A louder thump followed. Mystia leaned forward and peered into the hole, but stilll couldn't make out much inside the cottage

A muffled shout came from within the cottage. Mystia tensed up. Pounding footsteps approached.

Mystia leaned away from the hole just as Seiga leapt through it, with an overfilled sack slung over her shoulder.

"H-hey, um...!" Mystia squeaked. "What's happening?!"

"No time to talk, I'm afraid!" said Seiga.

"Um, but!" Mystia glanced between Seiga and the hole. "She woke up, didn't she?!"

"So it would seem! Just stay there for a few more minutes."

"A few minutes?! But she's—"

Mystia stopped mid-sentence, as Seiga gave her a cheerful wave and took flight. Within seconds, she'd disappeared into the forest.

Something deep inside the cottage was still moving around.

Mystia took a nervous step away from the hole, fidgeting with her sack full of food. It would be nice to prove that she was brave, but standing outside of the house of an angry youkai hunter wasn't really the best way to go about it...

Rapidly-approaching footsteps from inside the house demanded Mystia's attention, and she backed away from the hole, glancing indecisively toward the forest.

The footsteps got louder. Something vaulted out of the hole in a blur and landed heavily on the grass.

It was Marisa, wearing nothing but a nightgown and boots. Her hair was a mess. She looked like she'd reached the exact midpoint between sleepy and annoyed.

She glared blearily at Mystia for a moment before the eyes settled on the sack in her hands. Her lips pulled up in a challenging grin. "I'll be takin' that back now."

"A-ah, no, I don't think you understand, there's nothing in here except—"

And Marisa barreled toward her, and Mystia took off running, as quickly as her tiny legs would carry her.

"Seiga just asked me to help her!" she squealed as she ran. "I didn't do anything!"

"Guess that sack's just for show, huh!" Marisa shouted back. Between her voice and her footsteps, Mystia could tell that she was getting closer.

"There's just food in it! I, um...!" Mystia reached the edge of Marisa's yard now, and had to go quiet as she ducked unto the underbrush and began weaving through trees. Off in the distance, the forest was dotted with luminescent mushrooms, providing just enough context for her to pick out a path.

The pounding footsteps grew closer... closer...

Marisa tackled into her from behind, and they tumbled across leaves and beds of moss.

"Please don't exterminate me...!" Mystia squeaked.

As soon as the two came to a stop, Marisa sat up, keeping one hand on Mystia's shoulder to pin her to the ground. "I'm not gonna exterminate you, jeez." With her free hand, she tugged the sack out of Mystia's hands and upended it. "I just want..." The items tumbled out, and Marisa went silent.

Laying on the forest floor were one bottle of sake, three plates, and eight lamprey skewers.

"What the heck is this junk?"

"That's what I was trying to tell you! I didn't take anything, Seiga just had me stand out there like that and told me not to move!"

Mystia looked from Mystia to the pile of junk and lamprey. "She brought a frickin' _decoy_ this time?!"

"Um, decoy? … wait, 'this time'?!"

"Which way'd she go?!" Marisa demanded, ignoring Mystia's confusion.

Mystia numbly pointed in the direction that Seiga had fled in.

" _Right_."

Marisa pushed herself to her feet, and, after a moment to reconsider, crouched down and snatched up the bottle of sake. She leapt into the air and took off flying after Seiga at full speed.

Mystia was left sitting on the forest floor, with eight lamprey skewers and an empty sack in her lap. After ten minutes, neither Seiga nor Marisa had returned, and she decided to go home.

* * *

By the time that Mystia reached the stand again, it was almost dawn. Too late to hope for any more customers... not that the stand was in any condition for it, anyway. In her absence, the lanterns had burnt down, the fire under the grill had dwindled to smoking coals, and the counter was still covered with a few drool-smeared glass shards.

At this point, Mystia was just glad to be home. She dropped the sack on the bench, walked behind the bar, slumped down in her seat, and spent a few minutes just enjoying the peace and quiet.

Then, she lit a lantern, pulled out her tengu notebook, and angrily began to write.


End file.
